I am usually pretty meh about slow cooker chicken breasts. The problem is most days I over cook them because something comes up and I leave them in the slow cooker an hour or three too long. They are a bit dry and chewy. But, chicken breasts were on sale and I had them thawed so I decided on Teriyaki chicken.

I did my research this time before making this dish. On low chunked chicken breasts should cook in about 6 hours. I couldn’t leave it in the slow cooker all day so it took a bit of planning on my part. I knew I wanted to have dinner about 7 pm so I needed to have it in the slow cooker about 1 pm. Yes, we eat late because all the classes and practices after school.

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In an effort to help feed my daily snacking fix at work, I did a little research on a few new healthy snacking options for 2016. As many of my co-workers can attest, I always have a drawer full of snacks, some good and some not so good. For 2016 – out with the junk food and in with the healthy alternative snacking options. Here are a few of my favorite new treats that I’ve recently tried and wanted to share.

The Good Bean – Crispy Crunch Chickpeas

I wanted to incorporate good, healthy snacking options that were tied to adding more protein in my diet to help me feel full longer. So I read an article on The Good Bean company and their products. I recently tried the Thai Coconut Lemongrass chickpeas and I will say that I am hooked! To me these snacks are a cross between a soy nut from their roasted quality and a corn nut snack from their crunch. The flavor is amazing and I’m interested in trying more. Just a palm full is all you need to get your snack fix. A 6oz package was just over $6.00 on Amazon.

Nature Valley Granola Thins

I have always loved granola bars ever since the Market Day chewy chocolate peanut butter bars my mom would get for us kids. I always have a box of granola bars in the pantry. While trying to curb my sweet tooth fix, I ran over to Walgreens to find a snacking option. This is when I discovered the Nature Valley Granola Thins in dark chocolate. This 80 calorie snack square is packed with tummy filling granola and lightly dipped in dark chocolate to help satisfy any sweet tooth. A 10-piece box was around $3.50 at Walgreens.

Simply Snackin – Dried Chicken Breast Jerky

I love jerky! After watching a recent episode of Shark Tank talking about the booming gourmet jerky industry, I thought I would research a few options. I stumbled upon the Simply Snackin company and I was impressed to learn it was a Midwestern product made in Oshkosh, WI. According to their website, “Simply Snackin’s® all natural, gourmet jerky snacks have become the preferred on-the-go, protein-rich snack choice of people looking for a snack to support their health and wellness goal.” So I ordered a variety pack of 12 snack bars on Amazon for about $18. So far I have tried their chicken jerky varieties and each one has been very flavorful and kicks the hunger cravings at 10am and 2pm.

Have you tried any new snack items lately that you’d like to share? Please comment below as I would love to try anything new to substitute my daily banana and boring baby carrots. Happy Snacking! 🙂

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As many busy people can relate to, I really appreciate Facebook’s recent addition of the “save” feature which allows me to bookmark posts I’d like to save and read at a later time. While I don’t know when this function started, I know some people still don’t know it’s there as I still see posts like, “posting this to save for later.” The save feature allows me the opportunity save stories that I really want to read when I have two minutes to myself, like riding the train or in between my set wake-up time of 5:30am and my actual roll-out-of-bed time of 6:00AM.

Recently, with the turn of the new year, and my new year’s resolutions to eat smarter, I’ve been seeing a lot of healthy recipes posted on Facebook that I want to try, and the save feature has allowed me to find these much more easily when I want to use them. On weekend days, when my husband is at the firehouse, I tend to stay home with my son (pajama day), clean the house, do laundry and try new recipes. For last Sunday’s dinner I tried a recipe that my friend Chrissy posted on Facebook called Chicken Zucchini Poppers from TipHero.com. I thought this would be a great dinner for me and my toddler because it seems to be an easy, healthy dish that was finger food friendly. Also, when there is an award show on, who really wants to be chained to their stove? Instead, I want to be chained to the TV watching E!.

I prepared the dish almost exactly as described, although I did omit the cilantro, as I didn’t think my toddler would like the taste. Prep time was about 15 minutes, which was plenty of time to heat up the pan. One note: when I was shredding the zucchini I noticed that it was creating a lot of liquid – more than necessary for the dish – so I drained it out. Next time I would shred the zucchini on paper towel making it easy to ring out to drain the excess liquid before adding the zucchini to the chicken mixture.

Once the poppers were cooled, I cut them up for my toddler’s dinner with a side of strawberries. He loved them! Anytime I can sneak veggies into his food, (especially ones he’s never tried before), I chalk that up as a big win for this mommy.

Review: While this dish was easy to prep and my toddler loved it, I would say that the dish was lacking in flavor, which may have been caused by omitting the cilantro. Next time I would add a little lemon juice and fresh dill to the chicken mixture for the poppers and make a cool Greek yogurt lemon-dill dipping sauce.

Two-Minute Mom rating – Four out of Five Bottles. Overall, very toddler friendly, not quite flavorful for the adult palette, but short prep time and easy to make. Great for a quick weeknight dish!